now to the president and the congress and the fiscal cliff. the combination of automatic tax hikes and deep federal spending cuts due to kick in january 1st. that's 24 days away. just over three weeks from now but so far negotiations to find a way around it well they've gone nowhere. we'll talk about that with a former chief of staff to president bill clinton and adviser to president obama and a founder and chairman of the center for american progress which is a washington think tank and he joins us now from our washington bureau. john great to have you this morning. good morning. are we going over this cliff, john? >> i think -- i certainly hope not and i think that people -- there are low level talks again and i think that the president and the speaker need to engage with each other to try to avoid that. but what we need to do for the long run is really to get on a path towards greater fiscal discipline but do it in a way that keeps momentum behind the economy right now, keeps jobs growing. after today or yesterday's job report the worst thi